Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine familial effects on adult romantic relationships. Specifically, the study was designed to explore how the quality of sibling relationships can make independent contributions to a person's adult romantic relationships, while controlling for the effect of parent-child relationships. A sample of 433 adult volunteers completed measures of parent-child relationship quality, sibling relationship quality, romantic relationship quality, and romantic relationship attachment. Subjects also described each relationship using an adjective checklist created for this study. The analysis included 20 variables, which grouped into four categories: demographic variables, parental variables, sibling variables, and relationship variables. A series of hierarchical multiple regressions was performed. The first layer of the regression was comprised of demographic variables, the second layer was comprised of parental relationship variables, and the third layer was comprised of sibling relationship variables. The romantic relationship variables comprised the outcome variables. Results indicated that sibling relationship quality had independent effects on both romantic relationship attachment style and romantic relationship quality. Further, it was discovered that the effects of sibling relationship on romantic relationships differed for men and women. These results highlight the importance of the quality of sibling relationships, beyond other familial relationships. ^